Hey there folks...I know posts have been popping up like this all over the place but I need a bit of advice. Recently I finally decided to try and get a game up and running and considering it was my idea im DMing the affair. I have played quite a bit over the years but only once before have I ever tried to step into the boots of the DM...lets just say that did not end well.
So anyways I am looking for some advice from some of you all on here on how to be the best DM I can be :P
Some specific issues I have is trying to build fun and challenging encounters. I tend to not think along the lines of "More, more, more" in the way of mass numbers is actually all that fun but at the same time I dont exactly want to make a pack of goblins sudden tactical genuises just to make the encounter a bit more difficult. There is not really alot of variety for monsters yet considering the Monster Manual has not dropped yet so I am also having a bit of a time finding desigining encounters that will challange a level 5+ party without just making it 10+ orcs or whatever.
Also what kinda of CR total should I be aiming for around that level? My party isnt quite there but I'm trying to do some of the desing for the next part of the adventure before they reach that level.
I'll take any advice I can get, not only about the issues I mentioned but also in general about trying to better myself as a DM so as to give the most enjoyment to my players.
When I started typing this, I only had 3-4 in my mind, this ended up getting quite long.
- The game is no you vs. the players, you're not competing against them.
- Don't meta-game your villains (using knowledge the villain would not know). Example: Your PCs all have very high ACs because they focus on Defense more than Offence, so your monsters all have extra high attack values in order to hit them regularly. At this point, you've just stomped on everything the PC achieved by stacking defenses and made AC irrelivant. The reverse is true, setting your monsters ACs very high just because your players have high attack values,
- When you create a villain, remember that he's the hero of his own story. Why is he doing what he's doing? What drove him to it? Why was this the best way to achieve his goal? Making your villain have something sympathetic about them makes them much more interesting and 3-dimensional, even if the players never find out that the only reason the Orc Chieftan is raiding the village is because a group of hunters in town killed his mate and child and he's seeking revenge.
- Rip everything off thats not nailed down. Think about plots from old books, movies, ect. that you love and change things slightly and chances are you've just got an interesting story that none of your players are likely to recognise.
- When planning fights, they don't all need to be difficult, sometimes players just want to roflstomp something, or be rewarded with a one-sided fight because of clever planning. These fights though are best enjoyed when far between. Always a good indicator of a tense fight is one of equal footing. If you have 4 players at lvl 5, pick 4 monsters of about equal strength that have different roles in the fight, just like different PCs fill different roles in a fight. Can always make custom monsters by adding class levels to a monseter you already have.
- Reoccuring NPCs are always a welcome sight to players, especialy if they are villains. So if you have a villain that the party seems to click with, and either lothes them for what they've done, or finds them amusing, then concider giving them a reasonable escape plan before the players have a chance to kill them. When their HP gets low, maybe the party hears footsteps coming and the villain knows reinforcements are on the way, then when his HP drops to zero, they burst in, distracting the players long enough for him to activate a magic ring of teleportation / read a scroll / drink a potion of polymporph / a heroic npc tackles him out a window and they both land in the water only to have the villain escape.
- Think of your world as a living thing with concequences for stalling. If the players are off to rescue kidnapped townsfolk, make a note behind the screen of how often those townsfolk would be eaten / killed for fun / worked to death. If time isn't an issue, then most players will try and rest up as often as they can to get back resources. Or maybe if they assult the Goblin Warren during the day, most of the goblins are asleep, and will be roused by fighting. Or if they attack at night, maybe most of the goblins are out hunting and raiding, leaving only a few guards and women and children. Monster children are always a good conflic to present to players, as most characters will be split in what to do. "They are evil things and will grow up to kill innocents." but also "Maybe they are a product of their environment and can be taught a better way." or "Even if we take them, who would take care of them, they won't likely be welcome in any human towns."
- If using magic items, make them interesting and rare, a magic sword isn't cool anymore when everyone has one. Also, if you can't find the kind of magic item you're looking for, just make one up, if it ends up being too powerful, then have it destroyed / lost / stolen as part of the story. In this case, Rust Monsters are very handy ;)
- You are the GM, it's your game, your word is final in any rules arbitration. If players want to debate a rule that seems like it's in a grey area, best thing to do is say, "We're going to do it like 'this' for now, but we can talk about doing it the other way after the game." Don't let rules arguments derail your game, it's one thing to wait while a rule is looked up, but if what your looking up isn't important to the story tou want to tell, just make a ruling based on what would be more fun.
- Saying "yes" to players makes the game more fun for them than saying "no" most of the time. Example being, Player asks, "Is there an apothycary in town?" unless their is a story reason there wouldn't be one in town, say yes, it makes the player feel rewarded for thinking outside the confines of his character sheet.
- Don't roll dice unless the outcome is in question. This is often refered to as "Taking a 10", meaning if they can spend about a minute without something bad coming along, they just take a 10 on the dice roll instead of rolling. This saves quite a bit of time at the table if someone has a low modifier and keeps rolling low.
- Hostiges are always a good way for a monster to get away. If some orcs are fighting the PCs who are clearly winning, then maybe an orc grabs one of the unconcious players, or an NPC they care about, puts a knife to their neck and says, "Drop your weapons or I'll slit this ones throat." Readying an action to coup de grace the victim. Chances are the orcs would rather just escape, than try and capture all the PCs, so they say, "We're leaving, follow us and this one gets gutted." But be sure to follow through if the PCs call their bluff or try and do something the orc sees as threatening. If you kill a player this way, the player won't look at you as the one who killed them, they'll see the other players as the ones who GOT them killed. Though if a player has a clever way of distracting the orc or something along those lines, then maybe he doesn't notice the ranger fastdrawing an arrow and planting it into the orcs eye.
- As GM you'll long to play a character of your own and sometimes no one else wants to run. So you can always make your character and just turn him into an NPC ally to the party who helps out on occasion when one of the players misses a game, or half the group gets kidnapped. One thing I like to do if party members get captured and they are in a situation where they arent likely to get out on their own, I have the players of the captured PCs make villagers ect. that want to help with the rescue. This gives players a chance to run something as a 1-shot and goof around a little. Sometimes these villagers even become reoccuring or permanent party members.
I hope some of this wall was helpful.
I suggest reading both the Basic pdf and the DM basic pdf. DMing is much much easier if you know the rules. Also, the answer to your CR question is in the DM basic pdf. Finally, I would suggest running the starter set adventures before attempting to run your own show. Good luck.
Thanks fot the posts...gives me a whole lot to think about :P
Here's a quick, easy and useful tip you can use right away to make great encounters - combat, exploration or social - or even as the basis for an adventure:
1.) Put the players in a situation where they have to make a tough choice, A or B.
2.) Let them choose,
3.) Show them the consequences of both A & B. (Most important step)
The trick is to make the choice meaningful, but it doesn't have to be terribly original to be fun - remember, this is a RPG and not an elaborate movie plot.
Here are a few quick examples - you would need to flesh them out to use them:
1.) The party is neck deep in a big fight, and can either save the smith or the farmer's daughter.
2.) They save the farmer's daughter (of course).
3.) The farmer rewards the party with new horses, but the smith's brother swears a blood-oath against them for letting the smith die.
1.) Rumors of a powerful magic item surface, and everyone wants it. The party can either help the Priest or the Sheriff get it.
2.) The party chooses to help the Priest.
3.) The Priest blesses them and provides them with amulets of protection, but on their way out of town the Sheriff has them arrested for a fake crime.
You get the idea. Players love making meaningful choices and the consequences show them that the choice was meaningful.
You don't want to overuse this process, but as you gain experience you get better at hiding them in plain sight.
Good advice here.
I've found this site handy for some monsters: http://dizman.deviantart.com/gallery/46115620/D-D-Next
Not every "encounter" has to be combat. Riddles are a classic D&D trope. Here's some to get you started: http://www.dndadventure.com/html/riddles.html
In terms of interesting monster encounters, presentation is key. Without clever presentation, the monsters are reduced to stat blocks and numbers. Boring. Here's a way to solve that.
Follow the classic author's rule of "Show, don't Tell." You are an author, the lead author in a collaborative storytelling exercise.
Here's an example. You could say, "You see a party of orcs." Boh-RING.
Or you could Show them: "You carefully part the leaves of the bush you're hiding under. The bonfire flames flicker, shades of yellow, orange, and black. The fire is surrounded by abominations with matted hair, black skin, flashing red eyes, and spittle spraying from jutting fangs, all prancing to the fevered thumping of hide-covered drums. A female holds a squalling youngling to her naked breast, indifferent to the infant savagely biting her nipple and raking its nails across her chest. The celebration is overseen by a cruel shaman wearing a deer skull for a hat, eyes glassy with concentration, weaving where he stands, trembling hands outstretched in benediction. Something - you're not sure you want to know what - is bubbling in a massive, rough iron pot. The gentle breeze carries to your nostrils the reek of bitter herbs from the pot and unwashed flesh from the savages, and you've never been able to get over how burned hair is more of a taste than a smell."
So avoid numbers as much as you can. Some DMs keep track of all HP totals, including the party's. That lets you Show what's happening and keep it abstract. Rather than say, "Dave, the orc hits you for 5 points," you can say something like, "Dave, the orc slips his shortsword past your frantic parry and slices your arm with a nasty wound. You're beginning to think some healing will be necessary very soon." Of course, you don't need to keep track of all the HP; it's acceptable to say something like, "Dave, the orc slips his shortsword past your frantic parry and slices your arm with a nasty wound. Take 5 damage." In fact, I prefer the latter method, as it lets the player decide when to start worrying about his HP total.
That's my pre-coffee morning rambling. 
Cheers,
Bob
I'm not a fan of the zero-sum game plot device. Having to choose between saving one person over another nearly always leaves a bad taste in players mouths in my experience. It is also why you rarely see it in good drama. The other reason is that it is highly contrived. Rarely would situations align in such a way as to offer such a stark choice simultaneously. If I use something like the zero-sum game plot device, I always provide for a third option (and by default a fourth possible outcome of total failure): that the players can save BOTH, but at a higher cost to themselves. This is perferable because it offers a real choice.
As for further advice on encounters, it's pretty wide open, limited only by your imagination. It is perhaps easier to make a list of 'do not' do this.
- Don't simply have room after room filled with monsters without any context. Create a reason for all of these creatures to exist in the same location.
- Corellary to the above: leave some areas empty. If you notice in good movies and books, there are moments of quiet between action. This contrast between quiet and action makes the action more meaningful and intense.
- Don't ignore the environment. Try to be congisant of the environment that the monsters live in. I knew a GM once who designed an adventure that had a giant centipede alone in a room with a locked door. Of course as players we all wondered how the heck a giant centipede could exist in a bare room, or how it could even open a locked door. In the same adventure he had a Dragon living in a small cavern at the end of a 5' wide tunnel. How could a Dragon actually live in such a space? Monsters are simply not impediments to treasure.
- Corellary: Monsters will use their environment to their advantage, or if at least semi-intelligent improved their environment for safety and security. Kobolds are sort of over-used these days, but my group used to enjoy how devious my kobolds were (devious and incompentent). This is why I really like the Lair encounters that 5e introduces. These sorts of things add spice to any monster encounter.
- try to refrain from encounters that can only be solved in one way. From skill and RP encounters to combat, I always make sure there are multiple ways to succeed. And then I keep an open mind because players may find another, even better, way to overcome and succeed.
- As noted above by another poster, in most cases the villian, antagonist, or opponent will not have prior knowledge of player capabilities. It is beyond annoying to players if, say, your antagonists always have poison antidotes or neutralize poison spell prepared when your player's Rogue is a poison-using assassin. Now at higher levels this rule can be bent a fair bit in my experience because the characters become well known in the world and may have developed reputations (or signature spells as 5e describes). Think of Harry Potter and Expelliarmis. It became his signature spell, and subsequently a hinderance when trying to disguise himself.
- Little to no Deus ex Machina. And by this I mean planned encounters in which the players are saved by more powerful, last minute forces. If you're going to do this, make it REALLY obvious from the start of the encounter, and don't prolong the encounter. Second level characters being ambushed by a Troll shouldn't be whittled down to one remaining player before the planned help arrives. Let it play out for a few rounds at most, then bring in your plot-furthering device to help them. The other use of Deus ex Machina happens when a DM under-estimates the power of the encounter, and things go badly for the party. In my experience, it is almost always better to fudge die rolls then to bring in an NPC out of nowhere to fix your mistake. 5e provides a nifty way to help the DM on the fly in this regard with Inspirations. If things are going badly, I might dole these out more freely to the party.
I'm sure there's more advice I could suggest given time, but this is already getting long ;)
DerelictDroid wrote:
Hrrmm I see quite a few awesome ideas here. I like the idea of hostages and the like but it seems like something that I would really want to use very sparingly. Drama tends to fall off if every enemy grabs up some civilian or the like as a hostage.
I do really like most of these ideas and both of you offer very good points. I will defiantly find a way to work a lot of this into my campaign.
Right off the bat I am just gonna design a couple little hack&slash dungeons with some light story elements. I plan to try and introduce them to a general overarching story through their own personal stories.
For what it's worth, the Lost Mines of Phandelver is an above average published adventure and a great way to start off learning the new system with new players and very little prep.
We are actually running it now. It's going pretty well but I'm slightly afraid that after we run it they will be disappointed with what I can build afterwards.
Thats a lot of the reason I came on here for advice with level 5+ stuff since that adventure leaves off.
Gotcha. It's probably going to be a lot easier than you think. One way to make the transition - don't scrap the Lost Mine setting, just exapand it. When you are getting close to the end, start talking to your players about what other kinds of adventuring they would like to do in the area. It will be a lot easier to build an idea off of the adventure - like a spin-off TV show - than trying to create new content from scratch. Pg 51 of the adventure gives a few ideas for continuing - like the mysterious map they find in the cave. Also consider that once the mine gets up and going, the players get 10% of the profit - that's a good incentive to keep in the area. And once it gets going, it's going to attract a lot of attention...